The Bitter & The Sweet
by ThePandoraRose
Summary: Love isn't perfect, it just is. Moments in Angela and Arthur Petrelli's marriage. Please review.


**Title: **The Bitter and the Sweet  
**Rating:** PG  
**Pairing: **Arthur/ Angela  
**Disclaimer:** I own nothing  
**Spoilers:** Season 3  
**Summary: **Love is never perfect, it just is.

The Bitter and the Sweet

_"Love is overrated" -_ **Angela Petrelli Nov 2006**

"I'm scared," she whispered as he laid her down on the bed, his bride of 19.

"Don't be." He told her with wanton eyes. "It's me. You can never be scared of me."

"I'm pregnant," she spoke through her large grin, her arms wrapped around his neck, and he held her so tight it felt as if he would never want to let go. And how proud he looked when she looked into his eyes and said, "And I will give you nothing but sons."

"Don't go..." she pleaded, her eyes filled with tears as she took hold of his Navy uniform. "I don't know who I am without you."

"I have to. We must all make sacrifices." And he kissed the top of her head, letting his hand slowly ride against her pregnant stomach, knowing that if his touches were long, he would never let go.

"This is your son, Arthur. Meet your son, Nathan." She told him, holding the child on her hip, as tears filled her eyes.

He lightly brushed the thin skin of his lips over the fresh young hair of his boy's head.

"No son of mine will not be special!" Arthur demanded to his wife as he stood in his office.

"He's our son, he'll always be special." She retorted.

"I'm enrolling him in the program." He slammed the folder in his hand onto the table.

"No." She gasped. "There hasn't been enough testing, it's too dangerous. He's a child."

"Dr. Zimmerman says his system is better to handle it because of his lineage."

"It's too much of a risk - our son, Arthur - on our son!"

"I'm your husband and he is my son, and you will obey me."

And she did for she loved him and she feared him. She wanted to please him and her guilt for choosing her husband over her son would haunt her, even as she held his little hand and told him the shot wouldn't hurt.

She screamed and cried over the death of a child, lost, another miscarriage. She had two before Nathan was born and now again - no child. Her body shook and he held her tight, burying his head in her neck , the smell of his aftershave, always reminded her of that moment now that her memories had been returned. It was the first time he took a memory from her, but it was the only time she asked.

She smelled the roses he always had sent on her birthday, a grand gesture. So many flowers they filled the room, always the grand gesture. It made her heart beat like that giddy teenager when they first met, but it felt so empty in a sense. He spent so little time with her, gave her so little attention. it pained her. She missed him. And a woman like Angela always needed to have attention paid to her.

"Why?!" He screamed to her.

"Don't!" She yelled through her tears. "Don't hurt him, please. This was my mistake. Mine. I was selfish, I know that.... I missed you. I wanted you. "

"I've always been here, Angela."

"No, Arthur..." She said in a voice hoarse from tears. "Not for a long time now, not with me at least."

"I'd kill him if we didn't need him right now." He finally looked at her, the woman he would never get out of his head. "You're lucky." He put his hands around her throat. "You're lucky I don't kill you."

She looked frightened and scared and her mascara had started to run. "But you won't." She held in her tears. "Because you still love me." She paused and saw the hurt on his face. "Don't you?"

Arthur's grip loosened and She took her head and placed it against his. "Don't you still love me?" She repeated to the point one didn't know if she meant the words or if she was using them to manipulate him.

And before he could let himself feel anything, he threw her to the ground and left the room.

"You'll always be the love of my life, " She whispered, but of course he didn't hear it and never would. She knew it was her one failing, he was her weakness and she was his.

"I'll do anything..." the words ran through her head.

Arthur appeared at the door, hearing her thoughts. "Would you?" He said sternly.

Angela nodded her head and gazed up at him.

"I want another child." And in his own head the world, "marker" ran through his consciousnesses..

Angela gulped and nodded her head. She feared another child because she feared the pain of lost hope. She had such trouble carrying a child, she no longer had wanted to try and perhaps part of her feared the reason Arthur wanted a child in the first place, and it had nothing to do with love.

After hours of terrible labor, they were sure they would lose Peter. Angela lay asleep in her bed at Primatech. She had gone into labor during a terrible snow storm - no way to get to the hospital. Arthur sat next to her and ran his hands over the side of her head and stroked her hair.

The doctor came into the room and Arthur stood.

"Does he have the marker?" Arthur asked, his voice deep and stern.

The Doctor nodded his head and Arthur smiled. "Thank you." And the Doctor left the room. Arthur leaned over Angela's bed, kissed her on the side of the head and whispered. "You did good, Kid. You did good."

He loved her for who she was, so he never took her memories to the point that she wouldn't be herself, that she wouldn't talk back - he loved her spirit as much as her charm and beauty - her intelligence. But it was always when he feared she would leave him that he used his power on her, that he made her forget.

Once while the children were asleep, he stopped her cold in the middle of the foyer, causing the keys in her hand to drop to the floor like the tears on her cheek.

"No, Arthur!" He remembers her yelling. "Don't!" She was unable to move, but she knew what was coming.

He couldn't even understand how he had done it - he didn't mean to. All he wanted was for her to stay and she was unable to move. It may have been an accident, but it had begun. She never left him again, but he always did it when she was running.

"I wish you'd have more patience with him." Angela would often say to her husband. Peter wasn't the man he thought a man should be. She felt, in all her optimism, that he would be a great man one day, just like his father. But there was a lot Angela didn't know yet

Angela wasn't meant to be home, but she had forgotten something or another. She didn't remember, and so she was home hours earlier than she was meant to be. The car parked in the garage, Angela entered the house through the kitchen and headed toward the foyer when she heard voices and the words "Nathan" and "Kill" . She paused in her tracks, her body numb, in shock, her toes losing their feeling. And then he saw her, he called her name and she ran, for she feared him.

And when she let Daniel touch her head ever so lightly and lovingly - in fact Angela may have been the last person to remember Daniel Linderman had a loving streak, Angela's memories all returned in a flash, the bittersweet and the painful. So shocking to her system it broke her heart and did to her things not even Daniel Linderman or Adam Monroe's blood could heal. Her husband literally broke her heart and she would never be the same again.


End file.
